Camas prairies are found in several different geographical areas in the western United States, and are named for the native perennial camas ( Camassia }. The culturally and scientifically significant of these areas lie within Idaho and Montana. Camas bulbs were an important food source for Native Americans.
Named for the blue flowering camas—an important food source for all Native Americans in the interior Northwest—the Camas prairie is a traditional Nez Perce gathering place in north central Idaho. [1]
From the Nez Perce National Historical Park: Camas prairie is interpreted at a highway pullout on the north side of U.S. Highway 95, about six miles (10 km) south of Grangeville. [2] This large prairie was a Nez Perce gathering place, where camas roots were harvested for thousands of years. Several nontreaty bands gathered at Tolo Lake in early June 1877 in anticipation of moving to the Nez Perce reservation. In response to the forced move and other hostile actions, several young Nez Perce people took actions that precipitated the Nez Perce War.
Camas prairies are found over a large area, mostly privately owned, that extends many miles between the Salmon and Clearwater River drainages. Most of the area is agricultural and the northern section is within the Nez Perce Indian Reservation. Similar to the opening of lands in Oklahoma, the U.S. government opened the reservation for white settlement on November 18, 1895. The proclamation had been signed less than two weeks earlier by President Cleveland. [3] [4] [5] [6]
The area was home to the second subdivision of the Camas Prairie Railroad, [7] known as the "railroad on stilts" due to its numerous trestles, most of which were timber. Breakheart Pass, a 1975 film starring Charles Bronson, was filmed on portions of the railroad on the Camas prairie. The railroad ceased operations in the late 1990s. [8]
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In southern Idaho, east of Mountain Home, the high plain of Camas County around Fairfield is locally called the "Camas Prairie." [9] [10] [11]
The Camas Prairie covers the floor of the Camas Prairie Basin in Sanders County. This basin is a distinct north–south oriented elliptical basin that is drained by Camas Creek into the Flathead River at Perma, Montana. Both the prairie and basin are surrounded by north-south trending mountain ranges except where Camas Creek drains into the Flathead River. [12] [13] The basin is about 7 by 13 km (4.3 by 8.1 mi) in dimensions with an area of about 90 km2 (35 sq mi). [13] [14] The center of this relatively flat basin lies at elevations just below 850 m (2,790 ft). [15] The basin is bordered by the Salish Mountains on its eastern side and northern end and bordered by the Cabinet Mountains on its western side. These mountains rise above elevations of 1,500 to 1,600 m (4,900 to 5,200 ft). [12] [13] [16]
The Camas prairie region is sparsely populated and lies within the Flathead Indian Reservation. The two main populated places within this region are Camas (Ktunaxa: ya·qa·kmumaǂki [17] ) and Perma (Ktunaxa: kxunamaʔnam [17] ) [12] [13]
The basin in which the Camas prairie lies is a low-relief valley surrounded by mountains composed of metasedimentary strata that belong to the Prichard Formation of the Belt Supergroup. These strata are intensively folded and thrust faulted. The basin is filled with undifferentiated Cenozoic red, greenish, and bluish siltstone and mudstone and volcanic rock. A few sandy and gravelly beds are also present. These strata outcrop at the surface around the perimeter of the basin. Within the basin, they are cover by 15 to 30 m (49 to 98 ft) of Quaternary deposits that accumulated within glacial Lake Missoula. [12] [18]
The Camas prairie is well-known for the large fields of Late Pleistocene giant current ripples that cover a substantial part of its surface. [19] They were created during one of the many times when glacial Lake Missoula drained when its ice dam failed. From the northern edge of the Camas Basin, the fields of giant current ripples extend south (downcurrent) from four mountain passes that were once submerge inlets into the flooded Camas Basin. Southward, these fields of giant current ripples spread out and merge on the basin floor. These sedimentary bedforms are best seen in aerial images and at low sun angles. [20] [21]
These giant current ripples are large-to-very-large, subaqueous gravel dunes and antidunes. Although they once covered a significantly larger area, they cover about 26 km2 (10 sq mi) of the Camas prairie basin. The wavelength of these dunes and antidunes ranges from 90 to 951 m (295 to 3,120 ft) and their height ranges from 0.3–17 m (0.98–55.77 ft). They are all two-dimensional, flow transverse, sinuous, sedimentary bedforms. The wavelength and height of these giant current ripples decrease away (downcurrent) from the former inlets. Correspondingly, the size of the gravels comprising them decreases south (downcurrent) from boulder and cobble gravels to pebble gravels. Their foreset bedding is poorly defined and their dip varies from 14 to 23 degrees. In addition to the gravel dunes and antidunes, delta-like, expansion bars accumulated below each of the former subaqueous inlets. They consist of foreset beds that consist of boulder-cobble-pebble gravels. [19] [20] [21]
The Pleistocene deposits and bedforms in the basin have not been dated using radiometric dating methods. The lack of absolute dates prevents the construction of a reliable geochronology for Lake Missoula lake drainage events in the Camas prairie basin and correlation of the giant current ripples with bedforms and sedimentary deposits outside of it. [21]
The exposed gravel deposits underlying the giant current ripples at Camas prairie exhibit at least two beds of gravelly deposits that are indicative of deposition by separate Missoula floods. They are separated by an erosional unconformity with a buried and dismembered calcrete, carbonate soil horizon. The calcrete is 15 to 25 cm (5.9 to 9.8 in) thick. It provides empirical evidence of at least two separate periods of giant current ripple activity and associated with separate Missoula Floods that occurred thousands of years apart based the thickness and development of the calcrete. [22] [23]
The giant current ripples of the Camas prairie are analogous to similar giant Pleistocene bedforms described form Channeled Scablands of Washington. They are identical to the giant subaqueous bedrooms that formed on the bottom of Lake Kuray-Chuya during the Altai flood in Siberia, Russia. These giant bedforms, which are rare or unknown outside of theoretical and experimental studies, preserved a unique record of the paleohydraulology of a Missoula Flood associated with the catastrophic emptying of Lake Missoula. [19] [20]
The Nez Perce are an Indigenous people of the Plateau who still live on a fraction of the lands on the southeastern Columbia River Plateau in the Pacific Northwest. This region has been occupied for at least 11,500 years.
Lewis County is a county located in the north central region of the U.S. state of Idaho. As of the 2020 census, the population was 3,533, making it the fourth-least populous county in Idaho. The county seat is Nezperce, and Kamiah is the largest city. Partitioned from Nez Perce County and established in 1911, it was named after the explorer Meriwether Lewis. Most of the county is within the Nez Perce Indian Reservation, though Native Americans comprise less than 6% of the county population. Similar to the opening of lands in Oklahoma, the U.S. government opened the reservation for white settlement in November 1895. The proclamation had been signed less than two weeks earlier by President Cleveland.
Kamiah is a city in Lewis and Idaho counties in the U.S. state of Idaho. The largest city in Lewis County, it extends only a small distance into Idaho County, south of Lawyer Creek. The population was 1,295 at the 2010 census, up from 1,160 in 2000. The city lies in the narrow valley of the Clearwater River; downstream are Orofino and Lewiston, at the confluence with the Snake River.
Kooskia is a city in Idaho County, Idaho, United States. It is at the confluence of the South and Middle forks of the Clearwater River, combining to become the main river. The population was 607 at the 2010 census, down from 675 in 2000.
Craigmont is a city in the northwest United States in Lewis County, Idaho. Located on the Camas Prairie in north central Idaho, it is within the Nez Perce Indian Reservation. The population was 501 at the 2010 census, down from 556 in 2000.
Winchester is a city in western Lewis County, Idaho, United States, located on the Camas Prairie in the north central part of the state. The population was 356 at the 2020 census, up from 340 in 2010.
The Missoula floods were cataclysmic glacial lake outburst floods that swept periodically across eastern Washington and down the Columbia River Gorge at the end of the last ice age. These floods were the result of periodic sudden ruptures of the ice dam on the Clark Fork River that created Glacial Lake Missoula. After each ice dam rupture, the waters of the lake would rush down the Clark Fork and the Columbia River, flooding much of eastern Washington and the Willamette Valley in western Oregon. After the lake drained, the ice would reform, creating Glacial Lake Missoula again.
Lake Missoula was a prehistoric proglacial lake in western Montana that existed periodically at the end of the last ice age between 15,000 and 13,000 years ago. The lake measured about 7,770 square kilometres (3,000 sq mi) and contained about 2,100 cubic kilometres (500 cu mi) of water, half the volume of Lake Michigan.
The Palouse is a distinct geographic region of the northwestern United States, encompassing parts of north central Idaho, southeastern Washington, and, by some definitions, parts of northeast Oregon. It is a major agricultural area, primarily producing wheat and legumes. Situated about 160 miles (260 km) north of the Oregon Trail, the region experienced rapid growth in the late 19th century.
The Pend Oreille River is a tributary of the Columbia River, approximately 130 miles (209 km) long, in northern Idaho and northeastern Washington in the United States, as well as southeastern British Columbia in Canada. In its passage through British Columbia its name is spelled Pend-d'Oreille River. It drains a scenic area of the Rocky Mountains along the U.S.-Canada border on the east side of the Columbia. The river is sometimes defined as the lower part of the Clark Fork, which rises in western Montana. The river drains an area of 66,800 square kilometres (25,792 sq mi), mostly through the Clark Fork and its tributaries in western Montana and including a portion of the Flathead River in southeastern British Columbia. The full drainage basin of the river and its tributaries accounts for 43% of the entire Columbia River Basin above the confluence with the Columbia. The total area of the Pend Oreille basin is just under 10% of the entire 258,000-square-mile (670,000 km2) Columbia Basin. Box Canyon Dam is currently underway on a multimillion-dollar project for a fish ladder.
The Nez Perce War was an armed conflict in 1877 in the Western United States that pitted several bands of the Nez Perce tribe of Native Americans and their allies, a small band of the Palouse tribe led by Red Echo (Hahtalekin) and Bald Head, against the United States Army. Fought between June and October, the conflict stemmed from the refusal of several bands of the Nez Perce, dubbed "non-treaty Indians," to give up their ancestral lands in the Pacific Northwest and move to an Indian reservation in Idaho Territory. This forced removal was in violation of the 1855 Treaty of Walla Walla, which granted the tribe 7.5 million acres of their ancestral lands and the right to hunt and fish on lands ceded to the U.S. government.
The Nez Perce National Historical Park is a United States National Historical Park comprising 38 sites located across the states of Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington, which include traditional aboriginal lands of the Nez Perce people. The sites are strongly associated with the resistance of Chief Joseph and his band, who in June 1877 migrated from Oregon in an attempt to reach freedom in Canada and avoid being forced on to a reservation. They were pursued by U.S. Army cavalry forces and fought numerous skirmishes against them during the so-called Nez Perce War, which eventually ended with Chief Joseph's surrender in the Montana Territory.
The Channeled Scablands are a relatively barren and soil-free region of interconnected relict and dry flood channels, coulees and cataracts eroded into Palouse loess and the typically flat-lying basalt flows that remain after cataclysmic floods within the southeastern part of Washington state. The Channeled Scablands were scoured by more than 40 cataclysmic floods during the Last Glacial Maximum and innumerable older cataclysmic floods over the last two million years. These floods were periodically unleashed whenever a large glacial lake broke through its ice dam and swept across eastern Washington and down the Columbia River Plateau during the Pleistocene epoch. The last of the cataclysmic floods occurred between 18,200 and 14,000 years ago.
Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Plateau, also referred to by the phrase Indigenous peoples of the Plateau, and historically called the Plateau Indians are Indigenous peoples of the Interior of British Columbia, Canada, and the non-coastal regions of the Northwestern United States.
Camas Prairie Railroad Company was a short line railroad in northern Idaho jointly owned and operated by Northern Pacific Railway and Union Pacific.
The Columbia Plateau ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) encompassing approximately 32,100 square miles (83,139 km2) of land within the U.S. states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. The ecoregion extends across a wide swath of the Columbia River Basin from The Dalles, Oregon to Lewiston, Idaho to Okanogan, Washington near the Canada–U.S. border. It includes nearly 500 miles (800 km) of the Columbia River, as well as the lower reaches of major tributaries such as the Snake and Yakima rivers and the associated drainage basins. It is named for the Columbia Plateau, a flood basalt plateau formed by the Columbia River Basalt Group during the late Miocene and early Pliocene. The arid sagebrush steppe and grasslands of the region are flanked by moister, predominantly forested, mountainous ecoregions on all sides. The underlying basalt is up to 2 miles (3 km) thick and partially covered by thick loess deposits. Where precipitation amounts are sufficient, the deep loess soils have been extensively cultivated for wheat. Water from the Columbia River is subject to resource allocation debates involving fisheries, navigation, hydropower, recreation, and irrigation, and the Columbia Basin Project has dramatically converted much of the region to agricultural use.
The Ice Age Floods National Geologic Trail is a network of routes connecting natural sites and facilities that provide interpretation of the geological consequences of the Glacial Lake Missoula floods of the last glacial period that occurred about 18,000 to 15,000 years ago. It includes sites in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana. It was designated as the first National Geologic Trail in the United States in 2009.
Giant current ripples, giant gravel bars, gravel dunes or GCRs are a form of subaqueous dune. They are active channel topographic forms up to 20 m high, which occur within near-thalweg areas of the main outflow routes created by glacial lake outburst floods. Giant current ripple marks are large scale analogues of small current ripples formed by sand in streams. Giant current ripple marks are important features associated with scablands. As a landscape component, they are found in several areas that were previously in the vicinity of large glacial lakes.
The Altai flood refers to the cataclysmic flood(s) that, according to some geomorphologists, swept along the Katun River in the Altai Republic at the end of the last ice age. These glacial lake outburst floods were the result of periodic sudden ruptures of ice dams like those triggering the Missoula floods.
A pendant bar is a large, streamlined, fluvial bar that is typically composed of gravel which occurs just downstream of a bedrock obstruction within a river channel or floodway that has been scoured by either an outburst flood, megaflood, or jökulhlaup. They are often associated with giant current ripples. Malde introduced this to refer to streamlined mounds of gravel deposited by the Bonneville Flood that lie downstream of bedrock projections on the scoured valley floor of the Snake River. They are most common type of bar found within the Channeled Scablands created by the Missoula floods. The obstruction for the initiation of pendant bars in the Channeled Scablands is typically either a knob of basalt or the relict bend of a pre-flood meandering valley.
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